


Like They're Married

by sanctuary_for_all



Series: A Thousand Ways [13]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Declarations Of Love, Feels, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Helpful Tani, If They Won't Say Something She Will, M/M, They Both Think It's Unrequited
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-27 13:00:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13881384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanctuary_for_all/pseuds/sanctuary_for_all
Summary: Steve and Danny finally clear up some long-term misunderstandings about the other person's feelings (post-ep for 8X16).





	1. Chapter 1

Tani was perched on the edge of Danny’s desk, proving once again that she went to the Steve McGarrett School of Interacting With Furniture. “Your Uncle Vito doesn’t have _anything_ on the guy?”

“He said he’d check his paperwork.” Danny sighed, leaning back in his chair. “But, given that Vito considers bribery to be part of acceptable business practices, I’m not expecting too much.”

Steve had gone into NinjaSEAL mode over the information, of course, immediately making calls to a bunch of probably-covert sources in an attempt to find out more about the guy. Danny, on the other hand, almost wondered if having a scrap of information was worse than not having anything at all.

“Why are you having him help you with this, anyway?” Tani asked, and for a second Danny thought she meant in tracking down the shooter. Then she made that little grimace people always make when they know they shouldn’t butt into your personal life but they’re going to do it anyway. “I mean, I’m all over being there for family when they make terrible legal decisions, but there’s _got_ to be someone more reliable out there who can give you guys a hand.”

Danny shrugged. “There probably is, but those people would cost money. That, unfortunately, is not something we have a lot of right now.”

Now her expression had morphed into “there’s got to be some way I can help,” which was sweet but nearly as dangerous as it was when Steve got that look. “There’s got to be someone who wouldn’t charge you. Maybe I could—”

Danny straightened, holding up a hand. “No, it’s okay.” Then he winced, knowing he had to admit the real answer now. “The truth is, even Uncle Vito thinks the restaurant is a stupid idea. I’m comfortable ignoring him because he makes terrible life choices, but if we brought someone in who was actually an expert I might have to start listening to them.”

Now she just looked sympathetic. “You want to run a restaurant that badly?” she asked gently.

He hesitated, trying to put the feeling into words. It had started out as a pipe dream, born out of the constant low-level certainty that 5-0’s luck would run out, one of these days. Now, though, it had morphed into something else entirely. “A restaurant is like a marriage. You and your partner are both working together to build something, then to keep it going, and you’re both committed for however long it lasts.” He sighed, scrubbing his hands across his face. “And this is as close as I’m ever going to get with Steve.”

There was a heartbeat of perfect silence as they both realized what Danny had just said. Tani was the first one to break it, sounding as shocked as he’d ever heard her. “What did you just say?”

“Nothing,” Danny said fiercely, beyond grateful that his office door was shut. He knew that claiming he’d meant something else would be better than flat-out denial, but there weren’t a hell of a lot of other ways to interpret “I want to run a restaurant because it’s the closest thing to marrying Steve McGarrett that I’ll ever be allowed to have.” “I said absolutely nothing.”

Tani ignored the denial, still staring at him wide-eyed. “When the irony of you commenting on how married Junior and I supposedly sound didn’t actually kill you, I assumed you must just be the most clueless person alive. I think everyone kind of assumes that, actually.” Her voice had the same intensity Jerry’s got when he talked about one of his conspiracies. “But you _know_.”

If he kept denying it, Danny had no doubt she would follow him around the office with that look on her face. Steve would see it, Steve would ask about it, and Danny would end the day having to throw himself off a building somewhere. “How could I _not_ know?” He threw his hands up in the air. “He’s practically Grace and Charlie’s stepdad.”

Somewhere deep inside him, Danny wondered if Steve knew, too. Yes, the military had given him the social skills of those crazy people who lived in the woods, but he’d gotten the man a damn _stocking_. But Steve, thankfully, didn’t want to have the “I value our friendship” conversation any more than Danny did, so he stayed silent. He’d even agreed to be Danny’s partner, because he knew that it was the closest thing to what Danny really wanted that Steve would ever be able to give him.

Tani, however, was still busy having her mind be completely blown. “I know that. The rest of the team knows that.” Her brow furrowed. “Actually, sometimes I think the entire island might know that. But _you_ knowing that….” She focused on Danny with an intent look, and he braced himself for whatever she was about to say. “Why don’t you say something? You _have_ to know how crazy Steve is about you.”

Danny turned to his computer just so he would have something to do with his hands. “Steve’s level of insanity has nothing whatsoever to do with me. I’m pretty sure he was born with it.”

“Danny….”

His chest ached like someone had kicked it. “It’s not… you’re misinterpreting it. Steve’s like a golden retriever – kind of dumb sometimes, but ridiculously loyal. That’s all it is.”

Tani narrowed her eyes at him. “That may be true of the rest of us, but he’s different with you.”

Danny turned to look at her. “Maybe. But I’ll bet you the last three bucks I have in my savings account that it’s not the same kind of different it is with me.” He had no idea what he was showing on his face, but Tani looked so sad suddenly that he knew it had to be pretty bad. He scrubbed his hands across his face again, as if he could clear it away. “And if you bring any of this up to Steve, rest assured that I will find some way to knock you unconscious, take you to the top of the tallest building in the city, and drop you off the side.”

He looked up again. Tani had stood up at some point, but she was still watching him with an expression gentle enough to hurt. Danny swallowed. “He doesn’t need to deal with this.”

Tani didn’t say anything for a moment, then she smiled. “Don’t worry. The last thing I want to do is screw anything up between the two of you.”

After she left, Danny realized the comment technically hadn’t been an agreement.


	2. Chapter 2

Steve got off the phone, mentally scanning through his list of contacts to see if there was anyone else he’d ever worked with who might be able to get more information on Danny’s shooter. Most of the people he’d called so far had said they’d do what they could, but they’d all seemed surprised at the urgency with which he was trying to track down a dead man. Surely the threat had passed, right?

Steve didn’t know, which was what was killing him. The guy might have been on a revenge run all on his own, but it seemed odd to Steve that someone could hate Danny so much and Danny not even know who they are. He didn’t have a mother like Steve did, who lived the kind of life where that sort of thing was a natural consequence. But Danny… there was too much of a chance that it was someone _else_ who hated him that much, and the guy was just acting on their behalf. Someone who Danny _would_ recognize, and who was still out there.

He closed his eyes, pushing down the remembered terror of watching Danny slip away from him in that isolation room. He silently promised himself that it would never come to that again, no matter what he had to do.

To keep Danny safe, Steve would burn the world down.

There was the sound of someone knocking on his open office door. “McGarrett?” Tani’s voice. “Got a second?”

Steve opened his eyes. Tani was standing in his doorway, looking determined, which probably meant it was a good thing she’d come to him with whatever it was instead of charging off on her own. “Sure.” He gestured to the couch. “Come on in.”

She shut the office door behind her, which Steve absently noted was probably a bad sign for whatever she was about to say, Instead, she sat down in one of the chairs directly across from him, leaning forward so her arms were on the desk. “Why did you say yes to running the restaurant with Danny?”

Steve, who had been bracing himself for something more along the lines of “I’m about to break into an international criminal’s house, and you can’t stop me,” was thrown for a second. “What?”

She gave him a “seriously?” look. “Why. Did. You. Say. Yes. To. Danny?”

He had no clue why she wanted to know, but as it so happened he had a pre-planned answer on the off chance someone asked him. “It’s an exciting business opportunity with someone I already know I trust, and there’s a real lack of Italian restaurants represented on the island. It’ll give tourists an opportunity—”

Tani stopped him with a wave of her hand. “No.” She straightened slightly. “That’s a _speech_ , not a reason. And we both know that people only bother coming up with the speech when they absolutely, positively don’t want anyone to know the real reason they’re doing something.”

Steve leaned forward as well. If evasion wouldn’t work, he’d clearly have to go with challenge. “If that’s true, what makes you think I’m going to tell you?”

Suddenly, her expression turned sober and almost painfully sincere. “Because something really big might be at stake here, and it all depends on how you answer the question.”

He searched her face, but there was no sign she was anything but completely serious. Steve felt his first jab of genuine worry. She had to be talking about Danny, which meant that his partner was the one who was really worrying about this. Was he thinking of giving up again? And why had he gone to Tani with this, and not him? “What’s at stake?”

“I can’t tell you that.” Tani shook her head. “Not until I know what your reason is.”

If Danny didn’t feel like he could tell him before this, there was no reason to think he’d suddenly change his mind now. The easiest way to find out, unfortunately, would be honesty. “Fine.” He sighed. “I said yes to Danny because he asked.”

She gave him a skeptical look. “Did you ever want to run a restaurant before this?”

“No.” He had no real interest in running a restaurant _now_ , really. But Danny wanted it, and wanted Steve to do it with him, so Steve planned on pouring every cent he had into the thing rather than let Danny give up on his dream. “But Danny asked me to run it with him, so I said yes.”

Tani sat back now, the skepticism slowly disappearing out of her expression. “So if Danny asked you to jump off a cliff?”

He held up a hand, not sure what she wanted from him. “Danny usually wants me to jump off fewer cliffs. I’ve been trying to be more careful because I hate how much he worries, but I’m sure he wishes I was doing a better job of that.”

She was watching him carefully now. “And if Danny asked you to kiss him?”

Steve froze, feeling like he’d been slapped.

Tani leaned forward again, expression gentling. “The expression on your face is either telling me ‘Yes, but no one was ever supposed to figure that out’ or ‘How dare you ask me, a heterosexual man, such a question?’ I’m pretty sure I know which it is, but I can’t be 100 percent certain.”

Steve’s jaw tightened. “Leave it alone, Tani,” he warned, not quite able to keep the roughness out of his voice. “Danny’s straight.”

And if he found out Steve had been had been in love with him for years, he’d immediately feel guilty. They’d have to _talk_ about it, because Danny talked about _everything_ , and Danny would give him the “friend” speech and not even allow Steve to flee the room until it was all done. Things would get awkward after that, no matter how much Danny tried not to let them, and slowly but surely he’d start getting shut out of Danny’s and the kids’ lives.

That was the point where Steve’s imagination always shut down, everything that came after that too horrible to contemplate. It was so, so much better to let Danny keep being oblivious to Steve’s feelings.

“So Danny’s the one who’s straight?” Tani asked softly. “Not you?”

His chest hurt far worse than broken ribs. “Stop,” he said quietly. “ _Please_.”

“Okay.” She straightened, touching a hand lightly to the top of the desk. “But only if you promise to ask Danny the real reason he’s so intent on opening the restaurant with you. Not the speech, the real reason.”

Steve blinked, thrown all over again. “He loves cooking. And it was something he wanted to do after he retired.”

“That’s not the reason he told me.” She smiled a little. “I really think it’s one you’ll want to hear.”

Then she left, leaving Steve staring after her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter kind of grew on me, so I split it in half and there will now be four chapters.

Steve couldn't stop thinking about what Tani had said. _Ask Danny the real reason he's so intent on opening the restaurant with you._

He'd wondered, sometimes, if Danny asking him to help with the restaurant was a backwards attempt to talk Steve into retiring. A way to get him safely on the sidelines in case the radiation sickness got too bad.

But Tani had seemed to think it was a reason he'd _like_ , and he was pretty sure she knew him well enough by now to realize that wouldn't qualify. Besides, it turned out running a restaurant was at _least_ as stressful as getting shot at regularly, if not more so. Even if that had been Danny's reason at one point, it probably wasn't anymore.

A quiet voice in the back of his head kept whispering another reason, one he shut down hard every time he felt so much as a flicker of it. The universe had already given him a miracle when it dropped Danny and the kids into his life. Only an idiot would be greedy enough to expect another one.

He tried burying the thoughts with distractions, but even they eventually ran out. He'd done everything he could on Danny's shooter until Uncle Vito got back to him with more information, and the paperwork on the case they'd just wrapped up was distressingly easy to finish. Everyone else had already left, so he couldn't even offer to help _them_ with their paperwork.

Eventually, he remembered that there was still a hell of a lot of cleaning to do at the restaurant. Deciding that letting his hands work was the closest he was going to get to keeping his mind occupied, he headed over and planned on spending the evening trying to wrestle things back into shape.

Except Danny was already there, wearing a t-shirt and jeans and making Steve lose his breath a little bit. Luckily, Danny didn't notice, too busy disparaging the intelligence and ancestry of everyone Kamekona had hired. "... pretty sure they just closed their eyes and started swinging the hammer around in circles at this point. I'm not sure they were even _holding_ the...."

Steve closed his eyes a moment, letting the rant wash over him. It was probably a sign of brain damage, he knew, that he found the sound of it more comforting than the ocean.

"If you're just going to stand there for the rest of the night," Danny said, not looking up from the plastic he was sliding in to block a hole, "I'm gonna make you wear a hula skirt and be a stand-in for the damn statue Vinnie insisted on buying."

“I’ll have you know I look great in a hula skirt,” Steve said, opening his eyes and grabbing a rag so he could start wiping down the walls. Still, at the moment it would be even better if he could find some busywork where staring at Danny wasn’t an option. “Though if you want, I’d also be willing to go back to HQ and finish up your paperwork if you tell me where it is.”

That made Danny jerk his head up to stare at Steve. “Did you hit your head on the way here?” he asked, sounding genuinely stunned. “Is there some sort of new brain damage that I should be driving you to the hospital for right this very second?”

“Hey, I do paperwork,” Steve countered, a little worried now that he’d accidentally let something slip.

“When you absolutely have to.” Slowly, Danny got to his feet, his own expression morphing from surprise to somewhere between suspicion and worry. “But the only time you have ever, in all our years together, offered to do _my_ paperwork was when you were either trying to avoid your mother or brooding over a case.” Danny narrowed his eyes. “Is this about the guy who shot me?”

“Yes,” Steve said instantly, hoping that would be enough. Arguing about that for a few minutes would probably be enough to distract Danny from asking about anything else.

But Danny still just looked suspicious. “And we both know that you agreed to that way too quickly for that to really be the thing that’s eating at you. What’s—” He stopped abruptly, as if something had just occurred to him, and then all expression disappeared from his face. “Did Tani talk to you?” he asked tightly.

Steve froze. He didn’t say anything, didn’t mean to show anything, but whatever on his face was enough for Danny to squeeze his eyes shut and swear more creatively than Steve had ever heard from one of his COs. Steve had no idea what was happening, but he knew that the twist in his gut was pure fear. “Danny….”

Danny opened his eyes. “I’m killing her, Steve,” he said, anger vibrating in every word. “I’m letting you know now so you can start putting the ‘help wanted’ notices out early, but first thing tomorrow I am drugging Tani, taking her to the very top of the tallest building I can find, and then dropping her over the side.” He turned to start pacing. “You can even arrest me for it after it’s done, if you want. It’ll still be worth it.”

Steve stared at him, trying to figure out what was happening. _Steve_ was the one with the secret he didn’t want Tani to spill, so why would _Danny_ be the one angry that they’d spoken? Had Tani said something to Danny? If so, why would he have to ask if she and Steve had spoken? He tried to run back through the earlier conversation, see if there was anything in it that could possibly make—

_Ask Danny the real reason he's so intent on opening the restaurant with you._

No. There was no way. It was impossible.

But.

“Danny.” Steve’s voice was rough, his heart already starting to pound like a bass drum. “What’s the real reason you want to open the restaurant with me?”

That was enough to make _Danny_ freeze, the words jerking him to a halt as firmly as if he’d been grabbed. There was a heartbeat of total silence, then Danny slowly turned to look at him. “She didn’t tell you?” he asked, so many undertones in the question that Steve couldn’t pick them all apart.

Steve shook his head. “She said that I should ask you.”

Danny squeezed his eyes shut again. “And you don’t already know?”

That threw Steve. Danny was this upset at the thought that Tani had told him something, but he still somehow thought that Steve already knew what it was? “I only know the reasons you’ve told me,” he said carefully.

“Shit.” Danny sat down hard on the floor, bent forward and hands on the back of his neck. “Shit shit shit.”

Steve swallowed, but it did nothing to ease the fact that it felt like his heart was trying to climb up his throat. “Danny, just tell me.” He made himself keep breathing. “Whatever it is, I promise we can work through it together.”

Danny made a sound that was too heartbroken to be a laugh. “Yeah. That’s what every guy says when his best friend tells him he's in love with him.”

Steve’s heart stopped.


	4. Chapter 4

The silence felt like it went on for a century. When Danny finally dared look up – surely Steve's expression couldn't be _worse_ than what he was imagining – Steve looked like he was having a heart attack of some kind. He'd never seen Steve look so _shocked_ , like the news that Danny was in love with him had literally _fried_ _his_ _brain_ , and Danny's stomach dropped straight through their shitty floor when he realized that there would be no coming back from this. He'd just lost one of the three people who meant the most to him in the entire world because he was a paranoid asshole who couldn't keep his damn mouth shut.

Steve might as well hear everything, now. It wasn't like Danny had anything left to lose. "That's the reason I wanted to run the restaurant with you so badly, by the way. I wanted to get down on one knee, but I knew I didn't have a chance of doing anything but fucking up the greatest relationship I've ever had in my entire life. So I went with this." His gaze swept the disaster around them. "Hell of a metaphor, if you ask me."

Steve was breathing hard now, like he'd had to swap lungs with a normal human before running a couple miles. Bitterly, Danny wondered if that meant he'd finally found something that terrified the big strong SuperSEAL. He stood, an ache inside him he knew would never ease up. "So I'm going to leave now, drink myself blind, and hopefully forget all of this ever happened. I'd suggest you do that, too – if nothing else, it'll be hell on both of us if you remember any of this and have to explain it to me in the...."

The words trailed off completely when he realized Steve was slowly moving downward. At first Danny thought the shock had made him need to sit down, but he wasn't sitting. He was... he was kneeling. On one knee. Steven J. McGarrett was down on one knee in the exact same _fucking_ proposal pose that had been in every romance movie since the dawn of time.

In front of _Danny_.

He stared, trying to make what he was seeing make sense in his head. He couldn't manage it, the few brain cells he had left too busy trying to keep him from having a heart attack to do much actual thinking. "I don't..." The words weren't much more than a croak. "I don't understand what's happening right now."

"I'm down on one knee." Steve's voice was as rough as Danny's. "What do you think it means?"

The world lurched around Danny, just like it did in the split second before you fell a hell of a long way. The crash always came later, after you'd had plenty of time to contemplate just how much it was going to hurt. "That's _insane_ ," he rasped, suddenly terrifyingly sure he was going to burst into tears at some point. "I know... I know you want to be there for people, and you don't give a shit about your own happiness, but you can't just _throw_ your life away on whatever the _hell_ it is you're doing right now because it's what you think I need!" His voice broke. "I know you mean well, but this is _not_ how you deal with unrequited love!"

There was a moment of silence so deep Danny was pretty sure neither of them was breathing, then Steve swallowed. "You're right." His expression went heartbreakingly fragile. "You deal with it by staying silent, for years and years, because even if he never loves you the way you love him he's still the best thing that ever happened to you. You spend every second you can with him and his kids, even though a part of you is scared all the time that one day someone will notice you don't have any real right to be there." Steve blinked hard against suddenly wet eyes. "They're not yours, not really, but they're better than anything you could have ever possibly imagined. So you keep your mouth shut, tell yourself you’re fine with the way things are, and hope like hell no one tries to take it away from you.” He swallowed again. “I don’t want to do that anymore.”

The distant part of Danny’s brain still capable of thought was deeply regretting the fact that he’d stood up, because the odds were pretty high that he was going to fall over any second now. His entire body was trembling, hands shaking so hard that it took him longer than it should have to get a good chunk of skin pinched between his thumb and forefinger. He squeezed, as hard as he could, but he didn’t suddenly wake up at his desk or any one of the other places he could have fallen asleep and started dreaming all this. He was still here, standing in a wreck of a restaurant, getting the entire world handed to him on a silver platter by the love of his life.

Eyes stinging with the tears he knew were coming, no matter how much he didn’t want them to, Danny looked back up at Steve. “You’re serious.”

Steve had that earnest, Boy Scout look on his face, the one that always made Danny want to shield him from the rest of the world. “I swear to you, Danny. I’ve never been more serious in my _life_.”

It took real, concentrated effort for Danny to make himself breathe. He’d had plenty of experience with what it felt like when the world crumbled underneath his feet, and by this point had become a master at scrambling for solid ground so he could pick up the pieces and rebuild. But he was entirely unprepared for a world that was suddenly so much _better_ than he’d ever imagined it could be, like he’d just been walking along and suddenly tripped across a gold mine.

He swiped at his own tears, the reality of what was happening finally starting to sink in. “We’re both fucking idiots,” he rasped, a pressure in his chest that he was pretty sure was his heart threatening to burst out of it completely. If it did, it was going to take off flying and he’d never see the damn thing again. “We could have done this _years_ ago.”

Steve’s expression cracked open, as if even now he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. “Years?” he asked, voice thick.

“Like I said, idiots.” Slowly, Danny walked across the distance still between them. Steve sat back on his heels, an expression of stunned, naked hope on his face as Danny carefully went down on one knee in front of him. “Is it okay if I’m the one to do this?” he asked, still shaking a little as he took Steve’s hand in his. “I should have, before.”

Steve nodded, tears streaming down his cheeks. Danny’s own eyes filled again as he pressed a kiss against the back of Steve’s hand. “Marry me,” he breathed, looking back up into the eyes of the person he’d waited for his whole life. “Make me happier than I ever imagined I could be.”

“Yes.” The word was mostly a croak, but Steve’s eyes were shining and that was really all that mattered. “Absolutely yes.”

They moved into the kiss at pretty much the same moment, pulling each other closer as they did. First kisses were usually a mess, in Danny’s experience, with neither participant knowing what the other liked well enough to make it as spectacular as it could be with a little more practice, but clearly all the rules had been tossed out the window tonight. It was _amazing_ , the exact sort of choirs-of-angels, I-would-rip-off-their-clothes-but-that-would-mean-I’d-have-to-let-go-of-them kiss that movies had conned people into believing actually happened in real life. At least, Danny had _thought_ it was a con, but as he clung to Steve he was happy to admit he’d been completely wrong in this particular instance.

When they finally broke apart, Steve leaned his forehead against Danny’s. “How much crap are we going to get from everyone for skipping the dating part?” he breathed, still looking more than a little awed by the whole thing.

“Not any more than we’re going to get for taking so long to figure this out.” Danny grinned, not caring in the slightest. Hell, he might even become an optimist after this. “Are you worried?”

Steve’s lips slowly curved upward into that little boy grin that got Danny every single damn time. “Not in the slightest,” he murmured, leaning forward for another kiss.

000

The moment he got into work the next day, Danny pulled a small collection of bills out of his wallet and handed it to Tani. “I owe you.”

She looked down at the money in confusion, fanning it out to reveal three one-dollar bills. “Is this about the coffee? Because you don’t—” Then she froze suddenly, clearly having just now remembered their conversation from the day before. Her gaze shot upward again, staring at Danny with slowly widening eyes.

He turned around to hide his grin, and was already heading into his office by the time she started cheering.

**Author's Note:**

> Come check out my [original fiction,](https://jennifferwardell.wixsite.com/mybooks) my [blog,](http://jennifferwardell.blogspot.com) or say hi to me on [Tumblr](http://sanctuaryforalluniverses.tumblr.com)!


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